Smash monsters

Monster Hunter World is full of beasts that would make any zoologist yelp out in unbridled joy...although they’d be less happy when they find out that Monster Hunter World is all about killing those aforementioned monsters. Which in theory is just a case of hitting it until it dies while avoiding being hit yourself. Obviously. Yet beginners will find that there’s quite a lot to catch up on. If you’ve played other games in the series take a look at our Monster Hunter World tips, otherwise keep on reading for our Monster Hunter World starter guide where we’ll explain everything you need to know about weapons, armor, and huntin’ if you’re a series beginner. You’ll be the scourge of monsters everywhere in no time. Monster Hunter World starter weapons When you start off in Monster Hunter World, the choice of weapons is slightly overwhelming. No surprise considering there’s a grand total of 14 weapons to choose from. But instead of … [Read more...] about Monster Hunter World beginner’s guide: everything you need to know to get started

Monster Hunter’s return to consoles is a confident, barnstorming series best. In many ways the Monster Hunter series was ahead of its time. Though the fairly similar Phantasy Star Online predates it, Monster Hunter’s 4-player co-operative action RPG design and the treadmill of hunting for drops to get better gear has a whiff of that which has recently made Destiny so compelling about it. That makes now the absolutely perfect time for Monster Hunter World, the series’ big-budget return to platforms that can properly support this design with a near-constant internet connection. The result is exactly what you’d expect: the same exciting-yet-methodical monster-smashing combat atop a game that is now wired up in a manner that’s designed to keep its already satisfying loop of combat, upgrade and preparation even more fresh. This is a game where login bonuses, limited time events and drop-in, drop-out multiplayer sit happily alongside the same old hardcore … [Read more...] about Monster Hunter: World review – a more approachable, smartly tweaked series best

Monster Hunter World has turned the Exotic-garbed heads of a great many Destiny players over the last few months. And since the game’s launch on Friday, that hype seems to have translated into a good number of Guardians turning up in Astera’s marketplace, eager to join the hunt. I know, because I am among them, as are a lot of my hardest core Destiny crew. I’ll get into the deeper reasons for this in a dedicated article later in the week, but for now, I wanted to write a quick Monster Hunter primer for my brothers and sisters in the Vanguard who are either taking their first steps into a dino-smashing career, or are tempted to join up but unsure of just how at home they’re going to feel. The answer, you see, is ‘very at home’. While Monster Hunter is far more complex than Destiny (its influence on the notoriously deep Dark Souls quickly becomes clear), the broad sweep of its set-up, structure, game-flow, and progress path will be very familiar … [Read more...] about How to quickly understand Monster Hunter World (especially if you’re a Destiny player)

This weekend, why not spend some time surrounded by creeping death that approaches from all sides in the form of horrid aliens and giant spiders? Sounds appealing, doesn’t it? What if I told you that you don’t even have to leave your house and that it won’t cost you a penny? SOLD, you’d say, and I’d patiently restate that you don’t need to pay anything at all. Crimsonland, the top-down shooter that inexplicably doesn’t have a sequel (more on that shortly), is free to play via Steam right now and for the rest of the weekend. Hurrah! It’s great and you should definitely try it if you’re not allergic to Smash TV, monsters or the killing of monsters. If you buy Crimsonland during the free weekend, which has already begun and ends Sunday evening, you’ll get an 80% discount. That makes it £2.12. You used to be able to buy a house for that in the eighties. Now let’s turn to the subject of sequels, because the reason … [Read more...] about Smashing shooter Crimsonland is free to play this weekend

Back during the Game Developers Conference in March, developer Sucker Punch revealed a secret it had been holding back for years: InFamous 2, while still retaining its open-world, story-driven structure, will introduce tools for users to create and share their own custom missions within the game world. It’s an interesting idea to shoehorn into a sandbox game, and during a press event in Seattle Monday night, we finally got a chance to test-drive the creation tools for ourselves – as well as to go head-to-head with some of the new enemies electrically charged hero Cole MacGrath will face in the sequel. Some of those enemies will be on the huge side; the first mission we played pitted Cole against a massive, city-stomping boss called The Behemoth, which looked like a giant purple dust mite by way of Lost Planet. As the beast lumbered through the streets of New Marais, smashing buildings and slobbering noxious green goo everywhere, it quickly became apparent that there was … [Read more...] about InFamous 2 – hands-on with giant monsters and user-generated missions